The United Way Association of South Carolina is conducting a survey about The Self-Sufficiency Standard and would love to know your thoughts, feelings and needs surrounding the Standard. Organizations who participate in the survey will be entered into a drawing of a $150 gift card provided by the United Way Association. Two organizations will be selected from the drawing. To be eligible for this drawing organizations must submit the survey by August 31st. Winners will be announced by September 12th . To take the survey please click the link below. Thank you for your participation.

The Self-Sufficiency Standard for South Carolina 2016 was published in an effort to ensure the best data and analyses are available to enable South Carolina’s families and individuals to make progress toward real economic security. The result is a comprehensive, credible, and user-friendly tool. The measure describes how much income families of various sizes and compositions need to make ends meet without public or private assistance in each county in South Carolina.

The Self-Sufficiency Standard is a measure of income adequacy that is based on the costs of basic needs for working families: housing, child care, food, health care, transportation, and miscellaneous items, as well as the cost of taxes and the impact of tax credits. In addition, the report provides for each family type, in each place, the amount of emergency savings required to meet needs during a period of unemployment or other emergency.”